You wake in the middle of your life
in a wood tender with light. Familiar
trunks grown full slant sighing down
to loam. Daughters sprout in glades
streaming with milk-warm sun.

Summer sags past solstice. Poplars
dissolve in silver; bee larvae swell
waxen cells; cicadas split their stays.
Who is this porous one, limbs loosening,
whose waist opens, whose breasts relax?

You turn until your bearings fall in place.
You had not guessed it possible to walk
this way, and not so far. But you
remember this, as blood after its push
and braiding homes in on the heart.

Ease your knapsack down—strained
pouches, strapped-on gear. Your scalp
is damp to the roots as turned earth,
your eyesight softens, your knees melt—
Soon enough you will step out of flesh.